Birth Announcement with a surprise twist ending
AIDAN SEBASTIAN
Born at 4:40 am, Thursday, July 26, 2007
At St. Michael's Hospital in Toronto.
8 pounds, 8 ounces
22 inches long
14" head circumference
28 hours of incredibly intense labour, approximately 23 of which were unmedicated and intervention-free.
And the surprise? Just one baby in there. :\
While I did conceive and carry twins for a good portion of the pregnancy, one of them got reabsorbed part way through (Vanishing Twin Syndrome). My best guess, from the observations I made in my paper journal, was that it was around 20 weeks of gestation that Monkey took a leave of absence and decided not to return. But since that was half-way through and I'd been so used to feeling two bodies in there at that point (I'd felt them both moving by 10 weeks) that it was kind of like phantom motions in there until Peanut got big enough to compensate with actual movement. I honestly don't know exactly what happened and I'm ok with that. I chose to have an extremely low-tech pregnancy and even going through the shock and disbelief of discovering that Peanut was the only occupant at the end would still not change my mind about how I did things. Peanut is incredibly healthy and I am ever grateful for that.
It's so strange. Conceiving twins was never something I had imagined for myself. I had only ever envisioned getting pregnant and birthing, first a boy, and then, a few years later, a girl. Because of this, I am more ok with how things turned out than I think I would otherwise be. This is not to say that I'm totally ok with everything -- there's still a lot I need to deal with emotionally. But Monkey will get her turn, even if this means I have to go through pregnancy and labour again. And while I had an awesome pregnancy, it wasn't easy. Nor was the labour, for that matter. :-P But yes, it was totally worth it, and it will be again. In a few years. *g*
He's absolutely gorgeous. Photos are forthcoming.